Haunted
by 0BlueSpaceGay0
Summary: The war is over, Hive is finally gone and Daisy is free from the demon that controlled her. Right? Now we look and see that despite being free, Daisy is now trapped in a struggle of her own- battling the guilt and lonliness that comes from betraying her friends and seeing her past haunt her still...
1. In Every Corner Lies the Past

The tears had reached a point where the shirt sleeve could no longer hold back the water- and like a dam breaking, she let her arm slip to her side and and set fourth the salty torrent of misery. No wracking sobs shook her, no, she wept in silence and in solitude- no one would comfort her, but she knew she deserved it. The past weeks memories flashed in the back of her head

 _/Betraying the team, framing Lincoln, destroying the base, choking Fitz, nearly killing Mack, helping Hive.../_

A shudder ran through her and she almost choked on her build up of sorrow. They had told her that it wasn't her fault, it was Hive and his parasite powers- but they were wrong, they were in denial. It was all her, everything.

Being "Under the sway" as she called it, didn't change who you were, all it changed was your goals. Your drive. She could have chosen to use different methods to reach those goals as given by Hive, but she didn't. She was destructive and cruel, and because of this she can't be trusted.

She doesn't even trust herself.

Somewhere in her thoughts, she lingered too long and soon she found that her eyes stung.

Dehydration _from_ crying too much.

Daisy pinched her nose; she had officially reached a new low in life. Lower than being Mary Sue Poots, a friendless, damaged orphan.

She leaned back on her bed, the creak echoing out into the dim lit room. Damn, she was lonely.

And depressed.

And guilty.

She groaned and looked at her watch. 12:02 am.

Ever since her team- well, not really her team any longer as she doesn't really deserve their loyalty- rescued her from Hive's control and made their ultimate sacrifice to kill 'it,' she hadn't been sleeping. Nightmares plagued her when she closed her eyes, memories of what she'd done, even long before Hive took over. She thought sadly back on the friends she lost: Bobbi and Hunter, Tripp... And now...

She screwed her eyes tight.

No.

She can't think about him. His death is completely on her hands, dwelling on it will drive her mad.

Maybe it's too late to avoid insanity now.

Now that Hive has left her brain, that emptiness that haunted her before has returned. Sometimes she would just shake sporadically, getting intense mood swings and an itchy skull just craving, needing that hollowness to be filled. Withdrawal symptoms, she concluded. She had been addicted and now she was left with no release.

No one understands the pain she is in at this moment. She doesn't want their sympathy anyways. She doesn't want anything but for the quiet to last forever. She knows only one thing can give her that permanent peace though, but she's not that much of a coward to escape her problems like that. At least, not yet.

As the dryness in her mouth increases, Daisy resolves to get some water. No use in being useless. Dehydration really doesn't matter to me though, I'm not exactly helpful... She thought bitterly.

The trip is not far. Just a roll out of bed and 2 foot steps to the desk, where a water bottle waits expectantly.

She looks around at her smallish quarters and cringes. The loneliness hits her again.

Coulson had assured her that everyone just needed time to readjust and feel safe again, her included, but she didn't care if they ever felt safe around her again. Coulson also said he trusts Daisy, not currently as a member of SHIELD (just precautions), but he wouldn't even tell her where this base is located.

Some real trust there, Director.

The base is more often than not completely empty, besides her in the few weeks of being here- yeah, there are rare moments where Daisy Johnson leaves the room to stock up on food- and even when people do show up, she hides. They don't try to reach out to her, so she'll just keep pulling away.

She takes big swigs of the water and gulps down the whole bottle, licking her lips in satisfaction.

Daisy face plants back on the bed and considers searching through her semi-restricted laptop ("Just because she's cured doesn't mean that there aren't any lasting effects," said a wary Jemma) but sleep beckons her. As much as she wishes she could fight the drowsiness, she knows that humans and Inhumans alike need sleep.

Inhumans like Lincoln.

"I'm sorry..."

She whispers into her pillow. Part of her wishes he would come see her, but he no doubt hates her, loathes her, for what she's done.

After a series of depressing thoughts, a lot revolving around the death of him, Daisy falls into a fitful sleep.

 _He comes to see her after her first night back, she couldn't sleep- haunted by her actions and the dying face of Dr. Garner. Even when she tried to close her eyes, a burning nothingness threatened to consume her. That's when he stepped in, his breath hitching a little with the pain in his ribs, the pain fresh and ever-present. She couldn't look him in the eye, she couldn't see out her eyes even, Daisy was crying too hard. The guilt was too burdensome. She was about to ask him to leave when he hugged her. That was not what she was expecting. She expected anger, fear, a myriad of reasons for him to never speak to her again... But a hug? Incomprehensible. He spoke to her soothingly, and she clung to him. It was good to have her friend. Something hit her face. A hanging necklace, a cross that Yo-Yo wears, it dangles back and fourth in front of her vision and yet she didn't think anything of it. It was only when he was taking Hive's body somewhere far away that it hit her. The vision: A ship, a cross, a death... It wasn't over. He was about to make a sacrifice that she could have prevented. As the team shouted in confusion, she closed her eyes and remembered what she saw in real time. The ship would go out, and everything would float and then- fire. The end. The end of Agent Mackenzie..._

Daisy finds herself gasping awake, trying to shake the monsters from her vision. Mack... Oh Mack.

Flying into space to never return.

She saw the future, she could have- should have- done something to stop that. But she didn't.

She let Hive get the better of her, and she ruined everything.

Despite all of this, she found a hysterical laugh building in her chest.

"I'm definitely going crazy now."

She thought dryly.

She reflected back at the contempt in her former team's eyes when they had liberated her. Their smiles tried to hide their fear, but Daisy could see past them. She felt isolated, and in that moment, part of her wished they hadn't killed Hive and created the emptiness now festering inside her. The pit in her stomach was like a hungry beast, she fed it her sadness and misery and it only grew larger and more savage.

Over the next few days, she started leaving the bed less and less. There was no point, no love to be rekindled, no life to return to and no friends to be there for her.

Until one day, finally, she just didn't leave the bed at all.

The sun would shine through the skylight, and she would pull her covers higher. Coulson would come in, however apprehensive, and tell her she's not a prisoner and offer her work to do- but she just shut the door with a flick of her wrist. The will to do anything was robbed from her. Her concentration efforts thought only of all of the trouble she caused people. Her limbs turned to lead weights, her mind to stone. She shut everything out, taking in the silence that came from having wads of tissues stuffed in her ears.

She didn't cry anymore, but her breath would hitch and she'd curl inwards under the covers.

Someone had to notice this.

Someone had to care.

And they did. Of course they did.

Yet Daisy shut them out.

Another day past, and she finally had enough of waiting around for nothing to happen. She would do something today.

It started with getting out of this base.

She dragged herself out of the bed with a cough. She was only a little less than perfectly healthy, excessive bed rest aside, but she felt dead already- inside and out.

She didn't want to leave her little room, but she knew that she would never accomplish what she needed to do if she stayed.

Resolved, she twisted the handle (seriously, out of all the SHIELD tech at their disposal- keypads, passcode and finger scans- still a regular handle) and stepped out.

Daisy stretched her arms quickly, hearing a couple of loud cracks before continuing down the hallway in front of her. The room she stayed in was located at the end, and she hung close to the wall- even though there were probably cameras everywhere monitoring her very move. She breathed deeply and quietly, her determination to finish this task growing.

She creeped down the hall with the grace of a spy- as to be expected- and tiptoed down a set of wooden stairs.

Or at least, at first glance they looked wooden, but they are really a sturdy metal. Classic SHIELD.

She felt a shiver coming on even though the house (bunker, hospital, whatever) was a comfortable 70 degrees. Rather, it felt like it was 79 degrees.

Daisy frowned deeper. She didn't care about the temperature, she was worried that her former team would prevent her from getting out of here.

Coulson said she wasn't a prisoner, yes, but this is SHIELD, they manipulate the truth all the time to get you to comply.

At the base of the stairs, the place expanded into a large apartment of sorts. Directly to the left: a kitchen. To the right: a living room. And directly behind the stairs there was a rec room. Small, homely even; built for a couple or a three people maximum. Daisy could have believed it was an average place too, if the cabinets weren't stocked with guns, the lights lined with gadgets rigged and ready to hack and attack. That is, the place had been equipped before Daisy was plopped right into it.

Who was going to trust an ex-Hive devotee with a gun?

Daisy suddenly became very interested in her fingers. She hated looking at this place, it was too nice. She deserved a prison, with drab gray walls and bars, no real human contact...

She shivered. She was stalking. She strode forward, right up to the door knob and breathed.

She turned the handle, surprised when she heard it click open, and then blinked back the harsh light of day.

 **Author's Note: Hi! This is just my perspective on a possible ending to the season 3 finale of AoS and it delves a bit more into how I think a person would react to these circumstances. I expect a great deal of angst in the season finale and I better not be disappointed. I may or may not continue this depending if anyone wants to read it or not, but go ahead and review!**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Agents of SHIELD or its characters (though I wish I could...)**


	2. Can't Go On

**A/N: This update is a fill in the blanks for what's happening with the other team members, then next chapter will most likely just be pure Daisy-angst. Feel free to review!**

 **Disclaimer: See Chapter One**

"Gah..."

Daisy shielded her eyes against the light with her hand, unprepared for the sight of rolling pastures and hills to be beyond the door. What kind of SHIELD base was this?

With a quick glance back, she saw that the house she had been staying in was invisible to her sight, besides for the whole in space where the door opened and revealed the place inside. The building was cloaked, but she really didn't understand why. Not like she cared...

She strode forward on unsteady legs, thinking for a second that maybe it might be a good idea to grab some supplies from the house, but quickly pushed the thought away.

"This'llbe quick, this will be... Closure."

She assured herself, and with a hapless throw of her arm she shut the door.

She wasn't sure where she was going, how she was going to get there- but she was certain about one thing. She had to get away.

The monitor was blinking red and persistent above the lab computer, signaling the sleeping scientists to an event. The buzz sounded directly into Fitz's ear and he jerked up, papers sticking to his cheek and his hair a mess upon his scalp. Simmons, startled by Fitz, banged her head on an overhead light as she flicked the sleep out of her eyes. They realized that they fell asleep holding hands, something that hadn't happened in a long time.

"Cold as ever, Jemma." Fitz tried to joke, but the humor was lost because of the far off look in his eyes and the hollowness behind his words. Ever since Mack had died those few weeks ago, his whole demeanor changed. He spent more time alone in his room than with Simmons in the lab, and he hadn't touched a gear or tinkered with his hands. He had lost one of his closest friends, and now all he had was grief and... Well, Simmons.

Simmons was less focused on any comments Fitz was making and was more interested in the alarm that woke them up in the first place.

"Fitz," She exclaimed rather eagerly, "she's left the house!"

Fitz blinked, slowly and and confused. It took him a second to register what she had just said, but then it clicked.

"Oh! Well, um, what does this mean?"

Fitz had gotten used to just having Daisy be there, on her own little island away from the world, and over time he began to assume she would just never leave. He knew that he probably wouldn't. A ridiculous assumption, but Fitz had all the time in the world to make wild assumptions. What else was he to do- think of all that he should have done? Sit in silence and let the pain consume him?

Simmons coughed and attracted his attention again. He had spaced out, something he'd been doing often lately. He probably would have stayed that way had it been anybody but Simmons.

She started talking about Daisy- possibly sending someone out there to see how she's doing, asking if she wants to go somewhere, etc- but Fitz just wanted to take this moment to really look at her. She kept fidgeting with her hands, tapping a pen against her temple and nudging up her lab goggles. A bit of life had come back into her because of something as seemingly small as Daisy leaving a house, but it made all the difference.

He wished he could just sit there and watch her talk and be this excited forever, but he looked closer and saw the circles prominent beneath her eyes, a haunted gaze and a faceless ghost on her shoulder and knew that these moments could never last. He came to a realization just then. He can't change the things he took for granted in the past, but these moments- Fitz had to savor them.

He wasn't going to waste a single second more, and he leaned in and shut Simmons up with a kiss.

For a few seconds, everything was perfect. Then it ended.

"What was that for?" She asked with an eyebrow raised.

"For being there." He gave a classic Fitz smile, and Simmons returned it and resumed speaking. An old twinkle was back in her eye.

"So anyways, we need to tell Coulson that..."

Coulson's eyes lazily found the source of the beeping after snapping out of a daze. Simmons wanted him in the lab, which can only be really important good news or really important bad news. He sighed and rubbed his eyes with his real hand. He sat at his desk chair a moment longer and wondered when did it get so hard to continue?

Guilt was crushing him and he had no outlet. He couldn't even speak to May- she was still grieving Andrew. The whole team was grieving over something or another and Coulson felt personally responsible. Sure, that's not what he told them. He gave them the old 'it's Hive's fault, it's Hydra's fault- not ours' speech but he could tell that they didn't feel that way. How could they believe it when their own leader didn't believe it?

That's not even the worst part; on top of the deaths of fine people like Mack and Andrew, as well as the downward spiral of Daisy, General Talbot had been breathing down his neck about the Accords so he couldn't catch a break.

If Daisy had been up to it, he would have asked her to hack them out of this situation or have her do something, anything, to help- but she was completely out of it.

He'd visit, and at first it seemed she just needed to be alone, until after weeks of seeing her so lifeless it became painfully clear that she had simply lost the will to live. He could relate...

He should probably see her again, he should bring her back. Of course they had tried to, but they should try harder. How was anyone supposed to get better if they didn't try harder?Coulson knows that Daisy blames herself for Mack, yet that's not correct. Coulson knew about Daisy's vision- they all knew- he knew about the necklace, a spaceship, an explosion, and he dismissed it all at the last moment because it seemed like the war was over, that Daisy was wrong. A mistake, a misjudgment that cost SHIELD more than a valued agent, but also the glue that kept them in tact.

(Coulson stood up, he started making his way down the hall to the lab.)

They were trained for loss, they were trained to handle their emotions...

(He turned and walked through the doorway to an expectant Jemma Simmons.)

Still no amount of training will ever be enough to prepare someone for losing the ones they love most.

So much love and so much loss. Melinda lost Andrew, Fitzsimmons finally connected romantically, Bobbi and Hunter are off somewhere on the globe getting into trouble, and Daisy and Lincoln...

Well, Daisy was a broken girl who felt like no one loved her (lies) and Lincoln had drunk himself into a stupor. They tried to take away the alcohol, tried to put a stop to his problem before it got out of hand. Coulson tried to get him to talk to Daisy, but he just wouldn't. Lincoln was clearly still in love. He just couldn't go see her. He himself didn't even know why. Maybe he was afraid of her, maybe he was angry- or maybe he didn't know the right words to say.

So he didn't say them, he filled his head with static and his heart with liquor instead and watched as the ghosts danced in front of his eyes.

"There's always tomorrow..."

He'd tell himself before sleeping for the next 10 hours.

Melinda would watch him, a growing detachment in her gaze and a coolness that replaced the old, motivated way in which she carried herself. Andrew was the last straw, the one that broke the camel's back. She had grieved too long and felt too strongly- it was time to get back to the basics of training, how to not feel.

Even so, she felt some semblance of pity for the man drinking himself to death. She found him rather foolish and idiotic in a professional eye, but as someone who had felt as helpless as him at some point her life, even at this current point, she couldn't help but to sympathize.

Not like she was going to express it, and she walked swiftly by his room to see if Coulson needed her for anything. Anything at all.

Life would never stop for the needs of one person, let alone the desperate needs of the agents of SHIELD.


	3. Purpose

Daisy swayed on her feet, the sunlight too blinding, the pain in her temple too intense and the anger consuming her. Her withdrawal symptoms were still as insane as ever, and though in the beginning Simmons tried to help her, she forced her away. She wanted to suffer. She wanted this pain. It was a tiny, insignificant price to pay for what she had done. For now, she only had one goal, and nothing was going to stop her from achieving it. Especially those damn symptoms!

She had covered the perimeter of the island already, and she could confirm that it was tiny and led to nowhere. Great. All around her was ocean and sand, and further in was just rolling, grassy hills.

Some part of her told her it felt an awful lot like the way Coulson had described Tahiti, and she was ready to scream. What would putting her here possibly accomplish except reminding her of past suffering? Maybe they wanted her to suffer, they were mad at her…..

Her gut dismissed those thoughts though, no matter how appealing it felt to be despised. This couldn't be Tahiti, anyways. There's no people and it's far too small.

The only thought she allowed herself to dwell on was how she was going to get off this cursed island.

"-So, who is going to bring her home?" Simmons concluded, almost warily. Months ago they had agreed that if Daisy wasn't going to ask for help, they would wait until she finally left the house. Then they would act, because Coulson thought that by finally going outside, it would be a silent plea for help- she would be looking for something that those broody walls could no longer provide. And they would give her the comfort that the safehouse failed to give.

All Coulson wanted was for her to feel loved, to feel safe and free of guilt, no matter how impossible that was- and that started with her making the decision to leave the confines.

He sighed deeply, looking to May for her thoughts. May remained unreadable, distant, but he could detect for a brief moment a trace of compassion for her former student. He considered sending her to go retrieve Daisy, but then thought against it. He was already going, and with…. And with Mack gone, May would be needed here to run things if anything happened. He looked at Fitz, but it was clear he wasn't going to go. He was too busy with trying to make things with Simmons perfect, and Coulson had to admit- it was great that they were back to spending a great deal of time with her. Thats two less agents with crippling problems, seeing as how together they were functioning very well. He did not want to mess that up.

No May, no FitzSimmons, no Bobbi or Hunter or…. Coulson grimaced. Who the hell was going to come with him?

His team was looking to him for guidance, for a way to proceed and he had to answer Jemma.

He scrolled through his trusted agents mentally. There was Joey and YoYo, but after everything that had happened, he knew they wouldn't be too eager to help S.H.I.E.L.D, let alone Daisy.

Joey just wanted to hang out with his boyfriend, and YoYo had no one left to hang out with. That literally left about one person…

"Someone go get Lincoln. It's time for him to put down the bottle."

"Ugh," Daisy couldn't help but groan from her shady spot upon the beach. She was extremely thirsty, though she really didn't care. She was too busy preparing. Some part of her sensed an impending danger, perhaps S.H.I.E.L.D, and she needed to be ready to fight or flight. She wanted desperately off this island, yet she didn't think she wanted to depend on _their_ help- it would just add to the list of things she could never make up for and that list was already overflowing. She could swim off, hope for a nearby body of land, but she decided against that. It was impractical, risky and doomed to failure. That left her with one choice. Steal the plane they bring and get far, far away. The thought was like a knife in her gut, however, for the mere idea of betraying her former team again would surely push all parties involved over the ever-present cliff face they teetered on. She didn't want to be responsible for any more heartache.

Perhaps she could, what, hitch a ride? Get out quick?

Terribly amateur and stupid- still the element of surprise would be on her side, and this was nowhere near as bad as robbing or betraying the welcome committee. It was more like borrowing a ride from an uber driver. Except the uber driver is off duty and is more like a soccer mom trying to pick up their kid from summer camp. She shook her head. Dehydration was clearly getting to her.

Just as this plan became set in stone, an ominous roar came into existence above her head. Daisy pasted on a small smile, and it actually caused her physical pain. Forcing happiness was awful, yet sadly, she was accustomed to it. Now's the moment to put her acting skills to the test.

Coulson waited what felt like hours for May to finally get Lincoln into his office. He looked horrible, his eyes sunken, his face growing a rather prominent beard- not to mention his desperate need for a change of clothes. Still, he was fairly sober- which was becoming more rare- because they fortunately had gotten the alcohol away from him last night. A wise move on everyone's part, even though they couldn't have foreseen Daisy leaving the safe house and there was seemingly no reason in taking away his stash anymore.

Seeing his agent in this state, dead on his feet, he suddenly felt guilt-stricken. He had let it get this bad, there was so much he could have done to knock some sense into this rookie and instead he let his own emotions consume him. He would have just let Lincoln leave in whatever state, but he didn't ask to- which was overly peculiar since he had no incentive to really stay and no reason to contribute.

Lincoln fidgeted. He looked so much like he wanted to be anywhere else but here. Still, something betrayed that, just a speck of something in his usually cloudy eyes. A bit of hope that hadn't been there since Hive happened.

Coulson decided to bank on that hope.

"Lincoln, suit up. Daisy is coming home and you're going to be the one to bring her back."

Lincoln looked wary. This prospect was daunting and problemsome. Would Daisy even like what he'd become without her? He swallowed. He had to try. He had to try for her.

"Alright…" He managed out through his storm of emotions.

Coulson narrowed his eyes. He had ignored the agent too long- no time like the present to start training him again.

"I think you mean _yes sir._ "

"Yes sir."

Coulson looked at May. She stared right on through, yet a ghost of a smile played upon her face. Hope was igniting a long dead fire in their hearts.

They should have known it couldn't last.

"Sir, there's trouble…."

A worried, no, a **very worried** Jemma Simmons bursts into the office, her eyes flooded with franticness.

Even May stiffens- something horrible has happened.

"Agent Simmons."

Coulson addresses her, trying to remain professional in the face of fear.

"It's the island, sir. Someone… someone piloted a ship there. The cameras went down. The feed just cut off as a person, presumably male, stepped off and then they just stopped. We don't know what happened. No one else but us even knew about the base, to my knowledge, so either we have a traitor amongst us or someone went to great lengths to find Daisy. I-I'm trying to understand what exactly-"

"Jemma, its, um, its okay. I want you and Fitz in the lab running scans- whatever the hell you need to do to find out who went there and why. Lincoln, you'll have to skip suiting up. We need to go. _Now."_

Daisy didn't know who these men were, but they were definitely _not_ S.H.I.E.L.D. As soon as the ship landed, she knew. A sort of shiver just jolted down her spine, the ground became unsteady- and the real alarm went off when she could no longer feel the steady, humming vibrations of the electronics in the safe-house. An EMP had gone off, which only meant that they were foes, not friendlies. A surge of panic went through her thoughts of _I'm an agent, goddamnit!_ She did not want to be someone's captive again. She didn't want to be used or experimented on.

She pressed her back close against the tree closest to her, trying to still her racing heart. She won't go down without a fight.

A ramp descended down from the base of the ship, and the heavy footsteps of armoured men came marching out with distinct purpose.

Dread filled her. She was their purpose.


	4. Rage

Lincoln was on edge. No, that's wrong…..

Lincoln was _over_ the edge.

The poor guy was a pale as a ghost and shaking like a victim of hypothermia. His mind was muddled because Daisy was gone. Daisy had been, of course, gone for months, but now she was missing and probably scared and very depressed and, _god_ , did Lincoln feel responsible. Perhaps if he had set down the whiskey for one night and reached out to her, the love of his life, then she would have come home and been safe from the forces of evil that had ripped her away.

Coulson was faring no better, feeling very similar to Lincoln in the respects that he could have done more to help and save her. They both felt so useless and low- but that wasn't going to stop them from getting her back.

A quick scout of the island showed a few things, one being Daisy put up a _huge_ fight- the land itself was split deeply into smaller sections.

Two, there was no trace of any attempted human contact- whoever took Daisy wanted her solely, they were not doing this to send a message or get to the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Three, whoever did this had resources- not only did they have to first have the means to locate Daisy, but they also had to have the proper equipment to capture and transport her, all while being able to cover their tracks.

Coulson surveyed the land before him, taking a deep breath and releasing it. He had to shut-down and go back to being an agent; trained to let go, prepared for loss and for battle. It was hard, horrendously hard to just let go and pretend like the girl he considered his daughter wasn't a miserable wreck in the hands of some other power- but it was the only way he knew how to help. A hard edge developed in his eye; if he couldn't focus on the pain, he would focus on the only other thing he could depend on. His rage. Coulson had always been more of collected man, but then he had died. Then suddenly he was alive again and he built a team that fell apart and then he was director- his new-found life just kept escalating, so he just kept unraveling. There was too much betrayal in loss; with all of this responsibility came anger. The anger had become an arrowhead that directed him through the worst of things, for he could no longer depend on love, and he would let it guide him now. They would get Daisy back.

Lincoln, on the other hand, did not share the same training as the war-hardened director. He couldn't just turn everything off and forget what he was feeling, he couldn't focus on one emotion and push forward. This was _killing_ him.

But Coulson wasn't going to go back on his promise- no more agents were going to fall apart on his watch. He stepped towards the recruit, as if approaching a wounded animal, and placed a sturdy hand on his shoulder. Shoving away any problems he ever had about Lincoln, all his doubts and questions about his loyalty, he spoke out to him, "I know what you're feeling- hurt, lost, panicked- but none of that is going to help her. If you want to get her back and restore what was lost, you need to let your anger be a focal point- keep that at the forefront, and at the core- your passion. For now, those are the only emotions that matter. Everything else is obsolete."

Lincoln struggled to fill his lungs, but he pushed down his perturbation. None of his own insecurities would help him here, so he concentrated on the after and not the now. He thought about helping Daisy back to the base, the rest of the team smiling again- if he could get past this calamity, he could make that a reality.

He balled his fists and lifted his chin. He was going to get her back and become the best damn agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. if it killed him.

"Where do we start," he questioned, already walking to the quinjet. Nothing else would help them here, and if they were going to get leads then they had to leave. Now.

Coulson grimaced. He wanted to feel pride or something- he wanted to encourage his agent. But his job was done, so all he could do was follow Lincoln silently onto their vessel. He tapped his ear, opening the comms.

"Fitz, Simmons: What do you got for us?"

Daisy had reverted back to when she was a rebellious, street-hacker living on her own.

Suffice to say, she was lonely, curious and well, _sarcastic._ Also hurting. She winced, suddenly acutely aware of the ache in her ribs. _Definitely hurting._

The men who had taken her had been prepared to handle her powers, and though she had put up a tremendous fight despite being out of practice, she couldn't stop them from snapping on a pair of suppressor cuffs. She couldn't stop her smirk, however, because she had managed to take down at least 5 guys. They had hit her from every angle besides her face- and when she snappily asked why they didn't just knock her out, they just stood silent and ominous. She had her suspicions. The face made the first impression, and if you were capturing someone to give to someone else… You wouldn't mess with the face. When someone gave the order to, say, 'I want them alive and unharmed,' it usually meant: 'if I can't see any damage, then we're fine.'

They had her in a plane, one eerily similar to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s quinjets, and she was strapped into a seat in between two gas-masked man, which she thought was completely stupid seeing as that _they didn't even use gas against her._ How can a group of people be so informed yet so stupid?

Daisy looked around her surroundings- they didn't even bother putting anything over her eyes- and tried not to pay attention to her rather troublesome emotions threatening to overwhelm her. She let her mind slip back to all of May's training, (god, she hadn't thought about May in ages. A new kind of guilt picked at her- she should have asked how she was holding up after Andrew) and payed close attention to her breathing.

 _In. Out. In. Out._

Now was not the time for a mental break-down, so she resumed her scope of the area.

She barely contained a snort when her gaze passed over the 3 unconscious men strapped to the floor of the craft. The masked co-pilot turned to stare at her, she could feel the disapproving gaze boring through his sunglasses, and she felt extremely unsettled. Malicious intent was practically radiating off the guy. Turning away, she squinted at the man sitting next to her, noticing a small shape on his helmet. It was almost invisible to her sight, but it begged to be seen.

A red small, circle and… Her eyes strained, and then she froze. A skull.

Hydra.

The man must have recognized her panic, for he undid his mask and sneered.

"Out of the shadows," he taunted, "And into the light."

They were getting close to their destination, wherever it may be, so the other members of the party began to take their masks off. There wasn't any point in hiding anyways. There weren't any S.H.I.E.L.D. agents here to identify them and put a halt to their nefarious plans. Daisy was truly alone.

She felt the wind get sucked out of her and she screwed her eyes shut. This wasn't happening.

Her companion read that on her face, and responded in his well-versed jack-assery,

"Oh, but this is happening. I'd tell you why, except… I really don't want to."

 _In. Out. In. Out._

"God, I can't imagine what you're going through right now. Whatever it is, I absolutely relish it. Your team is the reason we're back in the dark, for now, so I must say it's great to have one over them for once. In fact-"

"Bring them into this," she spit out with a deadly edge, "and it will be the last thing you ever do."

He chuckled mirthlessly. "I assure you this, this has nothing to do with any friends of yours. This has everything to do with you."

This actually made Daisy disturbingly calm. She would finally pay for things she had done. A small victory in huge defeat. She would take it.

"Okay." She said rather plainly.

The men present tried to contain their sideways looks.

"Okay? Well, no one really asked. Anyways, we'll be there soon. I'd say good luck-"

"-But you really don't want to? Believe me, I get it."

 _Keep calm, stay sarcastic. Don't look as weak as you feel._ _And whatever you do, don't sell out your team._ Even though Daisy was fairly certain that these people- ugh, Hydra- were after her and solely her, the reason for them capturing is yet to be determined. It could very well be to draw the others out. Or it could be to enact revenge for killing Gideon Mallick… or not. Honestly, there were so many perfectly acceptable reasons for her kidnapping that she was okay with just seeing where the stones fell.

Daisy became so lost in thought that she almost missed the jolt and familiar clicking noise that signified their jet had docked.

The men around her stood and started filing out, while the one she simply called _Dulce de Douche_ grabbed her roughly by the wrists and began dragging her down the ramp. He smiled wickedly at her, revealing a red tooth (okay, thats a little overkill) and quite nearly cackled.

"Now it's time to have a little fun, isn't it?"

 **A/N: Gah! Sorry this is so late- I've been writing too many stories and now I haven't gotten around to posting any of them. Oops. Thanks for hanging in there! Shoutout to Shadow Wolf Artist who edits this stuff- QUICK GO CHECK HER STORIES OUT- and just remember to All Hail the Glow Cloud.**


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